Ex disputing CMS and making rival Child Benefit claim in 50/50 care

[fixatedplanet]

Hi all,

I’m really struggling with this and could do with some advice.

We’ve had a proper 50/50 week-on/week-off arrangement for the last 4.5 years. The boys (14 and 11) split their time equally between us week on/week off and we’ve always split the costs of shared things 50/50. He does his bit when they’re with him and I do mine. It has been working fine but....

The issue is income. I earn around £60k and he earns well over the £156k threshold. Because of that, even though it’s 50/50, I applied to CMS for child maintenance so he pays his fair share (it comes out at the maximum rate, around £800 a month which is a 50% discount as he has them 7 nights out of 14). I thought that was reasonable as his salary is much higher and he should pay more than half.

He immediately challenged it with a Mandatory Reconsideration, which was rejected because I receive the Child Benefit (he gave it up due to the high income charge and then during divorce said I could have it which only seemed fair). Now he’s put in a rival Child Benefit claim for one of the children AND lodged a tribunal appeal with the CMS. He’s basically trying to get out of paying anything through CMS and I could lose some of the child benefit now!!!

We are completely 50/50. He does everything on his time and I do everything on mine. But because he earns more, he should contribute more and CMS should sort this I would have thought, I should not have to go to a tribunal.I have started to gather evidence to try and show that I do more so it gives me a good chance at the tribunal and I guess he is doing the same now. I am going to get a barrister to help out at the tribunal to try and prove I do more but he does stuff too so not sure if that will help me.

I’m worried he might actually get the Child Benefit (even though he can’t claim it himself because of the high income charge) and that the tribunal might side with him. Does he have any chance of winning that? It just doesn’t feel fair because he earns much more than me even though we share all the care equally. He did offer to cover all of the shared costs but I have said no and decided to go down the CMS route as that will be more money than simply covering the shared costs.

Has anyone been through this? Can he really do the rival Child Benefit thing and what are his chances? I guess he has lots of evidence to show that we share care equally and have done for several years but he cannot even claim it so I would miss out! And what are the chances at tribunal? Surely they will see my side of things? He has started to pay me the £800 a month now so I have had a few months payment so far so that is good at least but I am worried I might lose it or be told to give it back.

Thanks in advance.

Well if chatGPT said it...

I dont understand why youd come here for advice then tell everyone their advice is wrong. Take it, or dont.. but dont ask for it if its just to complain.

So Child Benefit isnt means tested, if you have a child (by birth or adoption) that you provide support for in an amount equal to or more than the benefit amount you are legally allowed to claim it. It comes with non-monatary benefits too, so the person claiming gets national insurance credits towards their state pension and it ensures the kids automatically get their national insurance number.

Its just that if you earn over the threshhold you have to pay some or all of it back via tax. So high earners either pay that tax or opt out of recieving payments to begin with.

Child benefit dont care who earns what, if you have 50:50 custody and there are 2 children they will likely award you one child each. Its almost always what happens.

And from there he can appeal the CMS or file a claim in relation to the child he is awarded.

Read the other OPs experience.

The other poster thought the same thing as her ex couldn't claim it either but he was still awarded it.

Oh you are just trolling now surely

The CB office won't use chat GPT they will follow their processes
In this case that would be based on 50:50 care and they will award each parent one child each.

You ex allowed you to claim for both but now you have screwed him over by claiming maintenance so his only option is to counter claim CB
You could have kept both CB but now he can't trust you to not act underhanded

That’s not how it works.

Best possible scenario: you get your extra £400 a month and everything stays the same (the coparenting relationship and his other financial contributions). This is very unlikely to happen.

Most likely scenario: you get your £400 a month, but he stops any extra money/contributions, the co parenting relationship is fraught / not amicable anymore and he gives you no leeway on anything ever. You wanted to lice by the papers , that’s what it will be.

Worst case scenario: scenaRio 2 , but he also convinces both kids (or just the one he still pays for) to spend more time/completely move in with him. Then you owe him CM for both kids, and you lost your kids.

This is the reality you are faced with.

On the off chance you are genuine.. for absolute clarity in light of what the previous OP has told you happened to her..

What he earns is irrelevant for child benefit. It is not a means tested benefit.

He will have to pay it back in tax return but that is not a reason for them not to award him one child.

As was said previously on the other thread.. CMS has no investigative branch. It takes the word of the person who clicked the bracket and said they were owed. You in this case. It says on the website at the start that it is not accurate for 50/50 cases.

He will have had legal advice to claim one CB. That is the legal advice I would have given him as a former barrister.

He WILL be awarded one child benefit unless you propose to lie and say its not 50/50.

You will destroy a good co parenting relationship. Listen to @prolongedaffair Who has the absolute decency to come here and warn you of what happened to her after she got it in the neck across 2000 posts.

But if not.. promise you'll come back and tell us how it goes wont you?

@fixatedplanet and you've read the other poster's thread but it wouldn't apply to you? And you think AI is a more reliable source than real life cases?
You have so much in common with that other poster and she wouldn't listen to what she didn't want to hear either.
So maybe you just need to carry on and find out the hard way. Hope you're not spending that £800 a month, you could be heading for a big bill.🙄

@fixatedplanet don't believe what ChatGPT tells you. A case such as yours is not generic. Information and evidence will be case specific.

He can elect to have the underlying entitlement to receive child benefit but not actually receive any payments. Therefore, he will not have to repay anything through tax.

Once he is awarded child benefit for one child. There is nothing stopping him putting in a claim for maintenance from you. At this point he will almost certainly stop contributing to any shared expenses.

Don't forget if child benefit decide to let you have both benefits he can also appeal that and take it to a Tribunal.
CMS can only make decisions on the information provided to them by the parents. If conflicting information is received. They nearly always refuse the mandatory reconsideration and put it in the hands of the Tribunal. The Tribunal may well decide to close your case even if CMS didn't.

In the event CMS keep your case open for 1 child you will receive half the maintenance you were entitled to for 2 children, you will have to pay him maintenance, he will stop contributing more than his required CMS payment and you will lose 1 child benefit.

You're in a no win situation. I don't know why you can't see this. Nearly every single poster has told you this, even the poster that went through the exact same thing. Why do you think you will be any different?

Also this whole process will be time consuming and probably bring you a great deal of stress for many many months. They are not resolved quickly.

You aren’t married so you aren’t entitled to his earnings. You are 50/50 with child care so he doesn’t owe you maintenance. Why would you expect to be entitled to HIS money when he is already taking care of his kids 50/50.

If you wanted access to his money you should have stayed married to him.

Why are posters still interacting with the OP, it’s clearly a wind up to get a reaction! ChatGPT said…… 🤣

I can assure you I am not winding you up. I have asked on here for advice and yes I have asked AI for advice as well and it linked to other forums where the same thing was discussed, I will post a longer reply tomorrow I am feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the negative responses but thank you to those of you that can see my side. I am not money grabbing I just want what is best for my children.

The best thing for the children is not to have parents in conflict. It is best for the children of the parents can co parent harmonious as much as possible.
It seems like this was the situation till you decided to throw a ganade at the situation.

It's not like the level of difference in home life is such as they are in rags and scavenging from bins for food in one house while the other house they have servants and bathe in gold.
In reality one household may be able to afford slightly better holidays but the dad also offered to cover the additional costs such as trips in full but this wasn't good enough you wanted the extra cash

How is what you have done in any way going to benefit the children?

It doesn’t matter who can see your side. It just doesn’t matter. Personal opinion does not matter here.

Facts matter. And the fact is that you will lose this. Anything else is pointless to dwell on. Scrambling around forums and AI to get an answer you want is pointless. The reality of the situation is that he will win here.

I am worried you came here for affirmation not advice. And are only grateful to people agreeing with you.

I think a lot of what you see as negative is people offering sensible advice.

Its not nice to be called money grabbing but surely you can see when you divorced you got half his pension, 70% of the assets and now get 2x child benefit when he pays half the expenses and offered to cover all joint child expenses whilst doing 50% of the childcare. But you refused payment for all the childcare costs because you want more money for holidays and made a CMS claim.. surely you can see why in black and white that reads quite grabby?

Even if you think thats an unfair assessment.. most responders arent calling you names theyre saying if you have 2 children and do 50:50 fair is one child benefit claim each and thats likely how HMRC will see it and award it. And if they do you may need to repay the CMS youve recieved. You may not like hearing that but it doesnt make it not good advice.

Best of luck

That was me.

Sorry to hear you're still struggling with seeing your children. I do hope you get that resolved

Its not nice to be called money grabbing but surely you can see when you divorced you got half his pension, 70% of the assets and now get 2x child benefit when he pays half the expenses and offered to cover all joint child expenses whilst doing 50% of the childcare

Where does the OP say that?

I'll ask again

If YOU were earning more than him would you pay him more in maintenance?

Ah, fuck it then. I'll tell you what you want to hear.

Go do it. Make the claim, there can be no possible problem. Everyone supporting you know what they are talking about but the 80% who voted yabu are just negative ninnies.

This won't harm your relationship with your co parent and your children will be delighted.

I can't wait to hear how you can now afford luxury holidays

This is not about affording luxury holidays at all thank you. Someone posted about what the possible outcomes are here and this is what I think:

1 - I keep Child Benefit for both boys and continue to receive full maintenance (~£800/month)

2 - Child Benefit is split (he gets one child, I keep one) and maintenance remains full as CMS leave it (~£800/month but lose probably 60 a month in CB)

3- Child Benefit is split (he gets one boy, I keep one) and maintenance is reduced as I also have to pay him (so reduced at around £500-600 month)

4 - Child Benefit is split (he gets one child, I keep one) and maintenance is set to nothing and I lose 60 a month in CB for second child

5 - He gets Child Benefit for both children and maintenance is set to nothing, so I would lose 200 a month

6 - He gets Child Benefit for both children and I have to pay him maintenance £200

I would say that the most likely scenarios are 1, 2 or 3 here, and if that is what they decide then that is what is correct and fair in the eyes of the law. There is no need for insults I came for advice not to be made to feel like crap.

Plus a lot of this has to go through a tribunal anyway is most likely which as I understand is probably 6-24 months away reading online for how long that might take!

Surely you don’t get any maintenance for 24 months in a dispute though? It will stop once he gets the CB awarded to him and you will have to wait for the outcome of the tribunal so you will be up to 2 years with zero maintenance

Why do you think 1 2 or 3 are most likely?

So if you do "see all" on her posts.

In her OP she says for 4.5yrs theyve done 50:50 childcare on week on/week off basis. And half shared child expenses. When he appealed CMS they say its because she gets both child benefits shes the main carer.

She says they agreed shed get child benefit as he couldn't benefit from the money anyway.

And "It just doesn’t feel fair because he earns much more than me even though we share all the care equally. He did offer to cover all of the shared costs but I have said no and decided to go down the CMS route as that will be more money than simply covering the shared costs."

Then she commented in the thread and her first comment included "We agreed through divorce and actually I came out with almost 70% of the assets and half of his pension, no spousal maintenance was due and that is what was agreed then but that was a few years ago. And they did say that during divorce if the children were 50/50 then there is no CMS due but that does not appear to be the case as they have already awarded it to me and he is paying it, so clearly there is! It is not fair to make me go to a tribunal at my own expense to have to fight this he should pay the CM that they have said is due! He can afford it comfortably. We both have our own careers and when we were together we all benefited from his salary and now the children do not benefit from his salary when they are with me so he can afford to take them on lavish holidays whereas I cannot so I look like the poorer parent."

So by her account its 50:50 child care, expenses are 50:50 and she got 50% or his pension and 70% of their assets in the dovorce, she got child benefit for both boys and he offered to pay 100% of the child expenses and she said no because £800 a month was more and it isnt fair at his house they get lavish holidays and she looks like the poorer parent. Which she is.

2 or 3 aren't even possible. When he is awarded child benefit for one child, even if paying maintenance to each other is agreed, his requirement will not be £800 a month. Because that is for two children and you'd only be receiving child maintenance for one. But you aren't going to listen to anyone on this thread telling you what a terrible idea all this is. You'll reap what you sow.

2 isn’t even legally possible so no idea why you’d think it one of the likely scenarios